I’ve just got home from doing my workout. Walking back from the gym - getting bored as I do - My mind started to wonder upon lifes many mysteries.
I remembered seeing a post on here where someone had asked if the 10 minute walk home from the gym is too long a time to leave before taking a protein shake as this would not make it work to its full potential.
To overcome this I ran home to keep my heart rate up and yammed down a tuna sandwich (this being my main form of protein as waiting on delivery of protein shakes). When my shakes do come - will this method work or is there no point in running?
Also, as a beginner - been in serious training for a month, 18, 6ft and 170-175lbs (Varies as been weighing on different times of day etc). How many calories should I be looking to take? I’m doing a 4-day split body program.
Now I’m guessing this is going to be flamed but this is two of the questions I had and I was wondering if they could be cleared up for me.
Oh yeah, Another thing, The concept of bulking / shredding is something I am trying to achieve - I’m obviously in the bulking phase but how does the shredding part work? Just a brief idea would be good…
Hopefully someone will see this as a chance to display their expertise and show me the wise ways and endulge me in their wisdom.
Don’t worry about the ten minutes it takes to walk (or run) home. But you don’t really want all that protein after your workout. I’d drink a formula that has a 2:1 ratio of fast-digesting carbs and whey protein. With BCAA’s, phenylalanine, glutamine and creatine.
This is called Surge with added creatine. Hopefully it’s available in England.
If you’re a beginner, you’d probably do better with a full body workout rather than trying to split your workouts into body parts.
Since you don’t have protein shakes for PWO yet, why don’t you down some milk with your tuna so that you get some whey into your system? Whole food like tuna takes time to digest, and you want to get protein and carbs into your blood ASAP. You could do a lot worse than chocolate milk for your PWO if whey protein powder is unavailable.
And why not just take the shake or chocolate milk or whatever PWO drink you have with you to the gym? It won’t spoil in the hour it takes for the workout.
I started bulking at the beginning of this month at 190 pounds (6’1"). I’m eating about 4,000 calories a day right now, and I’m up to 200 pounds. Some of that is water because I started taking creatine when I began to bulk, and I was on a resticted carb diet prior to bulking. So my muscles have gained some water in addition to growing.
You’re going to put on fat and muscle with a bulk, assuming you’re lifting is adequate. But since you’re only 175ish at 6’, the added muscle will make the fat gain worth it. You aren’t going to look like a blimp even if your abs get covered by some fat.
Shredding is something you won’t need to do for a looooooooong time. Trust me, it shouldn’t be a concern for you right now. But basically, once you reach a lean body mass you want, you cut back on your carbs and bring your calories below maintainance so that you drop 1-2 pounds a week. You keep your protein high so that your body doesn’t cannibalize the muscle you worked so hard to build.
But please don’t cut/shred for a while. You’ll never be satisfied with yourself if you do it right now because you don’t have the muscle built up yet to look defined even if you get rid of the fat. You’ll end up losing too much muscle, which will make you want to cut even more because the remaining fat will not look good.
I would suggest ordering John Berardi’s Precision Nutrition, or trying to find an article containing such information. Just search around on the site and you’ll find some information. Try vroom’s thread for beginneers it has helped me tons. http://www.T-Nation.com/readTopic.do?id=640350
Read up on massive eating and Berardi’s 7 habits of healthy eating.
Basically I believe baseline is between 12-15 calories per lb of bodyweight (double check this). If you want to gain mass you need to add more calories. If you want to “shred” or “cut” you consume less calories.